.\" $Id: man.options.1,v 1.9 2025/08/28 13:46:57 schwarze Exp $
.\"
.\" Copyright (c) 2017, 2025 Ingo Schwarze <schwarze@openbsd.org>
.\"
.\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any
.\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
.\" copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
.\"
.\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES
.\" WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
.\" MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR
.\" ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES
.\" WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN
.\" ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF
.\" OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
.\"
.Dd $Mdocdate: August 28 2025 $
.Dt MAN.OPTIONS 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm man.options
.Nd assignment of option letters in manual page utilities
.\"
.\" Sources that occur repeatedly.
.\" Only use if the precise implementation time is unknown.
.\"
.de PWB
.No PWB/UNIX 1.0 Pq July 1, 1977 \\$1
..
.de At7
.At v7 Pq January 1979 \\$1
..
.de At3
.At III Pq June 1980 \\$1
..
.de Bx4
.Bx 4 Pq November 16, 1980 \\$1
..
.de At5
.At V Pq January 1983 \\$1
..
.de At8
.No Version 8 At Pq February 1985 \\$1
..
.de Bx43
.Bx 4.3 Pq June 1986 \\$1
..
.de At9
.No Version 9 At Pq September 1986 \\$1
..
.de At10
.No Version 10 At Pq October 1989 \\$1
..
.\" option was present in groff-1.01 as contained in 4.3BSD-Net/2
.\" and no mention of it could be found in the ChangeLog,
.\" so it's probably older than groff-0.4, where the log started
.de g04
.No probably before groff-0.4 Pq before July 14, 1990 \\$1
..
.de Eaton
.No Eaton Pq before July 7, 1993; 1990/91?\& \\$1
..
.\" man-1.5e was released on July 11, 1998.
.de man15e
.No man-1.5e Pq not before 1993, not after 1998 \\$1
..
.\" man-1.5g was released on April 7, 1999.
.de man15g
.No man-1.5g Pq not before 1993, not after 1999 \\$1
..
.\" code first seen in the initial import of man-db into CVS ,
.\" which was more or less debian man-db-2.3.17
.\" Colin Watson's first release was 2.3.18 on May 14, 2001
.\" no clue about it found in ChangeLog-2013,
.\" so it was probably already present before man-db-2.2a4
.de dbI
.No man-db probably before 2.2a4 Pq before Nov 8, 1994 \\$1
..
.\"
.\" --------------------------------------------------------------------
.\"
.Sh DESCRIPTION
This manual page lists option letters used in many different versions
of the
.Nm man ,
.Nm apropos ,
.Nm whatis ,
.Nm mandoc ,
.Nm makewhatis ,
.Nm mandb ,
.Nm makemandb ,
.Nm catman ,
and
.Nm manpath
utilities.
Option letters used by
.Nm groff ,
.Nm nroff ,
.Nm troff ,
and
.Nm roff
are also included because beginning with
.At v7 ,
many versions of
.Xr man 1
pass on unrecognized options to these programs.
.Pp
For each option letter, information is first grouped into paragraphs,
each paragraph describing similar functionality and starting with
one line briefly summarizing that functionality.
.Pp
For each program using the letter for that functionality, one line
is provided, giving the name of the program, a colon, the system
where this letter first appeared for this functionality in this
program, optionally a comma and a list of other system versions
introducing the same, a semicolon, and a list of current systems
supporting it.
If a system appears before the semicolon, it is not repeated
afterwards.
.Pp
Entries are sorted by historical precedence, except that obsolete
options are moved to the end.
Dates are commit dates where known, and release dates otherwise.
.Bl -tag -width 3n
.It Fl a
display all matching manual pages
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx 4.3 Tahoe Pq June 1988 ,
.Eaton ;
.Ox , Fx , Nx , No man-db , man-1.6 , illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
only display items that match all keywords
.br
.Nm apropos :
.No man-db Pq Aug 29, 2007
.Pp
use all directories and files for
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.Pp
.Bq superseded by Fl T Cm ascii
ASCII output mode
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.It Fl B
use specified browser
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-1.6 Pq June 24, 2005
.It Fl b
print a backtrace with each warning or error message
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
report whether the phototypesetter is busy
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.It Fl C
alternate configuration file
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.Bx 4.4 Lite1 Pq April 22, 1994 ,
.No man-db Pq Feb 22, 2003 ;
.Ox , Nx
.br
.Nm man :
.Nx 1.0 Pq Oct 26, 1994 ,
.man15e ;
.Ox
.br
.Nm mandb , catman , manpath :
.No man-db Pq Feb 22, 2003
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
.Bq obsolete
enable compatibility mode
.br
.Nm groff :
.No before groff-0.5 Pq before August 3, 1990
.It Fl c
do not use a pager
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx 4.3 Reno Pq June 1990 ;
.Ox , Nx
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
process given catpath
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Pq not before 1992, not after 1995
.Pp
recreate databases from scratch
.br
.Nm mandb :
.dbI
.Pp
produce a catpath as opposed to a manpath
.br
.Nm manpath :
.dbI
.Pp
internal option for use by
.Xr catman 1
.br
.Nm man :
.dbI
.Pp
reformat source page even if cat page exists
.br
.Nm man :
.man15e
.Pp
disable terminal color output in
.Xr grotty 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.18.0 Pq Oct 4, 2001
.Pp
recreate nroff versions from SGML sources
.br
.Nm catman :
.No Solaris 9-11
.Pp
.Bq obsolete
postprocess with
.Xr col 1
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5
.It Fl D
reset whatever was set with
.Ev MANOPT
.br
.Nm man :
.dbI
.Pp
print debugging info in addition to manual page
.br
.Nm man :
.man15e
.Pp
set default input encoding for
.Xr preconv 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.20 Pq August 20, 2008
.Pp
display all files added to
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.It Fl d
define a user-defined string
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
print debugging information
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6 , illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm manpath :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.dbI ;
.Fx
.br
.Nm mandb , catman :
.dbI
.Pp
remove and re-add a file to
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 2.7 Pq Feb 3, 2000
.Pp
.Bq superseded by Fl l
interpret arguments as file names
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5
.It Fl E
inhibit all error messages
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
select output encoding
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db Pq Dec 23, 2001
.It Fl e
preprocess with
.Xr eqn 7
.br
.Nm man :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
adjust text to left and right margins
.br
.Nm nroff :
.At7
.Pp
use exact matching
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.dbI
.Pp
restrict search by section extension
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db-2.3.5 Pq April 21, 1995
.It Fl F
use alternate font directory
.br
.Nm troff :
.Bx 4.2 Pq September 1983
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
preformat only, do not display
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-1.5g Pq April 7, 1999
.Pp
force searching dirs, do not use index (default)
.br
.Nm man :
.No illumos , Solaris 9-11
.It Fl f
.Xr whatis 1
mode
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx4 ,
.Eaton ;
.Ox , Fx , No man-db , man-1.6
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.No man-db Pq Dec 2, 2010 ,
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
set the default font family
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
force formatting even if cat page is newer
.br
.Nm catman :
.Fx Pq March 15, 1995
.Pp
update only the entries for the given file
.br
.Nm mandb :
.No man-db Pq Feb 21, 2003
.Pp
force rebuilding the database from scratch
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.Pp
locate manual page related to given file name
.br
.Nm man :
.No illumos , Solaris 9-11
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
do not feed out paper nor stop phototypesetter
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.Pp
.Bq superseded by Fl l
interpret arguments as file names
.br
.Nm man :
.At10
.It Fl G
preprocess with
.Xr grap 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.16 Pq May 1, 2000
.It Fl g
produce a global manpath
.br
.Nm manpath :
.No man-db-2.2a7 Pq Nov 16, 1994
.Pp
preprocess with
.Xr grn 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.16 Pq Feb 20, 2000
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
output to a GCOS phototypesetter
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
output to a DASI 300 terminal in 12-pitch mode
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB
.It Fl H
read hyphenation patterns from the given file
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
produce HTML output
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db-1.3.12 to 1.3.17 Pq not before 1996, not after 2001
.Pp
use program to render HTML files as text
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-1.6 Pq June 24, 2005
.It Fl h
print a help message and exit
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6
.br
.Nm manpath :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandb , catman :
.dbI
.Pp
display the SYNOPSIS lines only
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx 4.3 Net/2 Pq August 20, 1991 ;
.Ox , Nx
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq Sep 3, 2014
.Pp
turn on HTML formatting
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq Apr 2, 2013
.Pp
.Bq obsolete
replace spaces by tabs in the output
.br
.Nm roff , nroff :
.At7
.It Fl I
input file search path for
.Xr soelim 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.12 Pq Sep 11, 1999
.Pp
respect case when matching manual page names
.br
.Nm man , catman :
.No man-db Pq Apr 21, 2002
.Pp
input options, in particular default operating system name
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.2 Pq May 24, 2012
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.It Fl i
read standard input after the input files are exhausted
.br
.Nm nroff , troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
ignore case when matching manual page names
.br
.Nm man , catman :
.No man-db Pq Apr 21, 2002
.Pp
turn on terminal escape code formatting
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq March 29, 2013
.It Fl J
preprocess with
.Xr gideal 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.22.3 Pq June 17, 2014
.It Fl j
preprocess with
.Xr chem 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.22 Pq Jan 22, 2011
.It Fl K
source code full text search
.br
.Nm man :
.man15e ,
.No man-db Pq June 28, 2009 ;
.No Solaris 11
.Pp
input encoding
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.20 Pq Dec 31, 2005
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq Oct 30, 2014
.It Fl k
.Xr apropos 1
mode
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx4 ,
.At10 ,
.Eaton ;
.No POSIX , Ox , Fx , Nx , No man-db , man-1.6 , illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
ignore formatting errors
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq April 26, 1994
.Pp
preprocess with
.Xr preconv 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.20 Pq Dec 31, 2005
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
display on a Tektronix 4014 terminal
.br
.Nm man :
.At7
.It Fl L
pass argument to the spooler
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-0.6 Pq Sep 14, 1990
.Pp
use alternate
.Xr locale 1
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis :
.No before man-db-2.2a13 Pq before Dec 15, 1994
.Pp
print list of locales
.br
.Nm manpath :
.Fx Pq Nov 23, 1999
.Pp
use
.Xr locale 1
specified in the environment
.br
.Nm catman :
.Fx Pq May 18, 2002
.It Fl l
spool the output
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
interpret arguments as file names
.br
.Nm man :
.No before man-2.2a7 Pq before Nov 16, 1994 ,
.Ox 5.7 Pq Aug 30, 2014
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq Aug 30, 2014
.Pp
do not trim output to the terminal width
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.No man-db Pq Aug 19, 2007
.Pp
only parse NAME sections
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.Pp
legacy mode: search Nm,Nd, no context or formatting
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq March 29, 2013
.Pp
list all manual pages matching name within the search path
.br
.Nm man :
.No illumos , Solaris 9-11
.It Fl M
override manual page search path
.br
.Nm man :
.Bx43 ,
.Eaton ;
.Ox , Fx , Nx , No man-db , man-1.6 , illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.Bx43 ,
.No before man-db-2.2a14 Pq before Dec 16, 1994 ;
.Ox , No illumos
.br
.Nm catman :
.dbI ;
.Nx Pq July 27, 1993 ,
.No Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
prepend to macro file search path
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
do not show the context of the match
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq May 22, 2016
.It Fl m
specify input macro language
.br
.Nm nroff , troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 4.8 Pq April 6, 2009
.Pp
augment manual page search path
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis :
.Bx 4.3 Reno Pq June 1990 ;
.Ox , Nx
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq Apr 4, 1999
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
override operating system
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.No man-db , man-1.6
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , manpath :
.dbI
.Pp
override architecture
.br
.Nm man :
.Fx Pq Jan 11, 2002
.Pp
show the context of the match
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq May 22, 2016
.It Fl N
do not allow newlines between
.Xr eqn 7
delimiters
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.01 Pq Feb 21, 1991
.It Fl n
specify a page number for the first page
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
.Xr nroff 1
output mode
.br
.Nm man :
.At7 ,
.At8 ,
.At10
.Pp
do not create the
.Xr whatis 1
database
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq July 27, 1993
.Pp
print commands instead of executing them
.br
.Nm catman :
.Fx Pq May 18, 2002 ,
.No Solaris 9-11
.Pp
limit the number of results
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.Pp
dry run simulating
.Xr mandoc.db 5
creation
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.It Fl O
output options
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 4.8 Pq Oct 27, 2009
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.It Fl o
select pages by numbers
.br
.Nm nroff , troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
force use of non-localized manual pages
.br
.Nm man :
.Fx Pq June 7, 1999
.Pp
optimize index for speed and disk space
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.It Fl P
pass argument to postprocessor
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-0.6 Pq Sep 14, 1990
.Pp
use specified pager
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6
.Pp
turn on pager formatting
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq Apr 2, 2013
.It Fl p
preprocess with
.Xr pic 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
use the given list of preprocessors
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6
.Pp
dry run, display commands instead of executing them
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq July 27, 1993 ,
.Fx Pq March 15, 1995 to May 18, 2002 ,
.No Solaris 9-11
.Pp
print warnings when building
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 2.7 Pq April 23, 2000
.Pp
do not look for deleted manual pages
.br
.Nm mandb :
.No man-db Pq June 28, 2001
.Pp
print the search path for manual pages
.br
.Nm man :
.Nx Pq June 14 , 2011
.Pp
turn on pager formatting and pipe through pager
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
set phototypesetter point size
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.It Fl Q
print only fatal error messages
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Aug 29, 2012
.Pp
quick mode of
.Xr mandoc.db 5
creation
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.It Fl q
invoke the simultaneous input-output mode of the .rd request
.br
.Nm nroff , troff :
.At7
.Pp
quick mode: prefer preformatted page if available
.br
.Nm man :
.At8 ,
.At10
.Pp
issue no warnings
.br
.Nm manpath :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db
.br
.Nm mandb :
.dbI
.Pp
print only warnings and errors, no status updates
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Aug 29, 2012
.It Fl R
postprocess with
.Xr refer 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.02 Pq June 2, 1991
.Pp
recode to the specified encoding
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db Pq Dec 31, 2007
.It Fl r
set number register
.br
.Nm nroff , troff :
.At7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
scan for and remove junk files
.br
.Nm catman :
.Fx Pq March 31, 1995
.Pp
set
.Xr less 1
prompt
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db-2.3.5 Pq April 21, 1995
.Pp
use regular expression matching
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.No man-db-2.3.5 Pq April 21, 1995
.Pp
turn off formatting
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Nx Pq Feb 10, 2013
.Pp
check for formatting errors, do not display
.br
.Nm man :
.No illumos , Solaris 9-11
.It Fl S
manual section search list
.br
.Nm man :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6
.Pp
safer mode
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.10 Pq May 17, 1994
.Pp
restrict architecture
.br
.Nm man :
.Ox 2.3 Pq March 9, 1998 ,
.Nx Pq May 27, 2000
.br
.Nm apropos :
.Ox 4.5 Pq Dec 24, 2008 ,
.Nx Pq May 8, 2009
.br
.Nm whatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.It Fl s
preprocess with
.Xr soelim 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
silent mode, do not echo commands
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq April 26, 1994
.Pp
restrict section
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.man15g
.br
.Nm man :
.Ox 2.3 Pq March 9, 1998 ,
.Nx Pq June 12, 2000 ;
.No illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm apropos :
.No man-db Pq Nov 16, 2003 ,
.Ox 4.5 Pq Dec 24, 2008 ,
.Nx Pq May 8, 2009 ;
.No illumos
.br
.Nm whatis :
.No man-db Pq Nov 16, 2003 ,
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014 ;
.No illumos
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
do not look for stray cats
.br
.Nm mandb :
.dbI
.Pp
.Bq SysV compat, recommends Fl S
manual section search list
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db Pq Jan 1, 2008
.Pp
.Bq superseded by Fl h
display the SYNOPSIS lines only
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
pause before each page for paper manipulation
.br
.Nm roff :
.At7
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
.Xr troff 1
output mode, small format
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5
.It Fl T
select terminal output format
.br
.Nm nroff :
.At7
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5 ,
.dbI ,
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 4.8 Pq April 6, 2009
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
use UTF-8 for
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 5.6 Pq April 18, 2014
.Pp
.Bq superseded by Fl m
use other macro package
.br
.Nm man , catman :
.No Solaris 9-11
.It Fl t
.Xr troff 1
output mode
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB ,
.At7 ,
.Bx 2 Pq May 10, 1979 ,
.At3 ,
.At5 ,
.At8 ,
.At10 ,
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db , man-1.6 , illumos , Solaris 9-11
.br
.Nm catman :
.No Solaris 9-11
.Pp
preprocess with
.Xr tbl 7
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
check manual pages in the hierarchy
.br
.Nm mandb :
.No man-db-1.3.12 to 1.3.17 Pq not before 1996, not after 2001
.Pp
check files for problems related to
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 2.7 Pq April 23, 2000
.It Fl U
unsafe mode
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.12 Pq Dec 13, 1999
.It Fl u
update database
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Pq not before 1992, not after 1995
.Pp
create user databases only
.br
.Nm mandb :
.dbI
.Pp
update database cache (requires suid)
.br
.Nm man :
.No before man-db-2.2a10 Pq before Dec 6, 1994
.Pp
remove files from
.Xr mandoc.db 5
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.Ox 3.4 Pq July 9, 2003
.It Fl V
print the pipeline on stdout instead of executing it
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-0.6 Pq Sep 2, 1990
.Pp
print version information
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis , mandb , catman , manpath :
.dbI
.It Fl v
print version number
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.Pp
verbose mode
.br
.Nm catman :
.Fx Pq March 15, 1995 ,
.No mandoc Pq June 30, 2025
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.man15g
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.No man-db Pq Dec 29, 2002
.Pp
print the name of every parsed file
.br
.Nm makemandb :
.Nx Pq Feb 7, 2012
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
produce output on the Versatec printer
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB
.It Fl W
disable the named warning
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-0.5 Pq August 14, 1990
.Pp
list pathnames without additional information
.br
.Nm man :
.man15e
.Pp
list pathnames of cat files
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db Pq Aug 13, 2002
.Pp
minimum message level to display
.br
.Nm mandoc :
.Ox 4.8 Pq April 6, 2009
.br
.Nm man , apropos , whatis :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.It Fl w
list pathnames
.br
.Nm man :
.At7 ,
.At3 ,
.At5 ,
.At8 ,
.Eaton ;
.Ox , Fx , Nx , No man-db , man-1.6
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandoc :
.Ox 5.7 Pq August 27, 2014
.Pp
enable the named warning
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-0.5 Pq August 14, 1990
.Pp
only create the
.Xr whatis 1
database
.br
.Nm catman :
.Nx Pq July 27, 1993 ,
.No Solaris 9-11
.Pp
use wildcard matching
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis :
.No man-db-2.3.5 Pq April 21, 1995
.Pp
use manpath obtained from man --path
.br
.Nm makewhatis :
.man15g
.Pp
update the
.Xr whatis 1
database
.br
.Nm man :
.No illumos
.Pp
.Bq obsolete hardware
wait until the phototypesetter is available
.br
.Nm troff :
.At7
.It Fl X
display with
.Xr gxditview 1
.br
.Nm groff :
.No groff-1.06 Pq Sep 1, 1992
.br
.Nm man :
.dbI
.It Fl y
use the non-compacted version of the macros
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5
.It Fl Z
do not run preprocessors
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db-2.2a5 Pq Nov 10, 1994
.It Fl z
suppress formatted output from
.Xr troff 1 ,
print only error messages
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.It Fl 7
ASCII output mode
.br
.Nm man :
.No man-db-2.3.5 Pq April 21, 1995
.It Fl \&?
print a help message and exit
.br
.Nm groff :
.g04
.br
.Nm man , manpath :
.Eaton ;
.Fx , No man-db
.br
.Nm apropos , whatis , mandb , catman :
.dbI
.El
.Pp
Multi-letter options:
.Bl -tag -width Ds
.It Fl hp
.Bq obsolete hardware
output to a Hewlett Packard terminal
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB
.It Fl 12
.Bq obsolete hardware
use 12-pitch for certain terminals
.br
.Nm man :
.At3 ,
.At5
.It Fl 450
.Bq obsolete hardware
output to a DASI 450 terminal
.br
.Nm man :
.PWB
.El
.Pp
In
.At v3 ,
.Xr man 1
had no options.
.br
The syntax was:
.Sy man Ar name Op Ar section
.Pp
In
.At v4 ,
.br
the syntax changed to:
.Sy man Oo Ar section Oc Op Ar name ...
.Sh AUTHORS
This information was assembled by
.An Ingo Schwarze Aq Mt schwarze@openbsd.org
using
.Bl -bullet -compact
.It
the Unix Archive of the Unix Heritage Society
.It
the CSRG Archive CD-ROMs
.It
the
.Fx
SVN repository
.It
the
.Ox
CVS repository
.It
the
.Nx
CVS repository
.It
the GNU roff (groff) git repository
.It
the 4.3BSD-Net/2 groff CHANGES file (Oct 1990 to March 1991)
.It
the 4.3BSD-Net/2 groff ChangeLog file (July 1990 to March 1991)
.It
the man-db CVS and git repositories (since April 2001)
.It
the man-db NEWS file (April 1995 to Dec 2016)
.It
the man-db ChangeLog-2013 file (Nov 1994 to Dec 2013)
.It
release tarballs man-1.5g (July 1998) to man-1.5p (Jan 2005),
man-1.6 (June 2005), and man-1.6a to man-1.6g (Dec 2010)
.It
a makewhatis release tarball without version number from 1995
.It
the illumos manual pages on the WWW
.It
and Solaris 11, SunOS 5.10, and SunOS 5.9 machines at opencsw.org.
.El
